The Indiana State sentinel. [volume] (Indianapolis) 1868-1895, 1887-06-08
Seeding with Oats.

II. Stewart, of North Carolina, writes to
the Country Gentleman on how to get
good crop of oats and a good stand OF clo-
yer at the same time. He says: "Iremem-
Der q crop of oats / grew in Pennsylvania
in 1864; on reference to my record ] find
ten acres gave me 7S3 bushels, measured
from the threshing machine. The straw
was five feet tall and the grain weighed
forty-seven pounds to the bushel. This
was from seed procured from Scotland,
called the Angus oats. The land was we'll
MANFRED in February. Twenty large sled
loads per acre were spread on the snow aud
left until a pril, when IL was piowed under
with twenty-seven-inch lap furrow, laid so
that the soil and the manure laid in alter.
nate layers, sloping forty-fve degrees. a
thorough narrowing mixed the ma
the seed was sown right after the
harrow, and Immediately covered
in, with a.second harrow following the
sowing. The narrowing. | remember, was
very thoroughly done, tapping two-thirds
every turn, so that the ground was stirred
three times. While the first harrow was
getting ahead and making room for more
oats, went back and sowed the clover aud
grass seed on the fresh, mellow soil. was
then an adv0cate-as / am now-of liberal
sowing and used a peck of each to the
acre.
The oats were sown at the rate OF two
bushels to the acre, Just twenty bushels on
the ten acres. When the oats were cut the
ground was covered green with clover, not
q spear of timothy was to be seen, and, it
was pastured off by a flock of sheep, off
and on, until the winter. The next year
made twenty-five tons OF hay, estimated in
the hay shed at 700 cubic feet solidly
packed sixteen feet high in the shed, for a
ton. The timothy scarcely showed, the
clover was so rank, until the third year.
The same year / sowed timothy and
clover on July II with buckwheat, and had
an excellent catch, much better than had
the year after on fall wheat, seeded in a
late snow in April.
Since then have frequently sown clover
alone, ana with timothy and orchard
grass, with oats and never had a failure.
Two years ago l sowed clover aud timothy
with oats here in North Carolina, and the
next fall Professor Roberts, of Cornell
Agricultural College, was here aud saw the
clover, and thought it as good as any he
had seen elsewhere. List summer from
two and one-half acres / cut seven loads,
about half ton each, OF hay the first cut
tipg, and four the second cutting, and left
heavy aftermath on the ground. -Four
years ago / scwed twenty acres OF clover
and timothy with buckwbeat here in
North Carolina. and never had a better
catch. The first cutting was rather
light on account of an unexampled dry
time; but last summer the yield was a
full one, and this spring the field looks
promising for third excellent crop.
have just finished seeding an eight-acre
! field OF oats with clover and mixed grasses,
and tke yeung oats and clover both prom
| Use to turn out very sattsfactorily. / have
sown clover with millet in July, with tur-
nips In August, and am now getting about
ten acres ready to SOW with millet and seed
with clover, orchard grass and meadow fes-
cue in June, and some newly.cleared land
will be sown with buckwheat and seeded
with clover in July. Thus have, think,
very fully tried the possibilities of sowing
clover with various crops, and am able to
| say that there is nothing in the oat crop
or any other crop-itself to prevent the
| successful seeding of clover with IL.
My observation for many years has been
| that no other crop is so poorly managed as
oats. The corn stubble, exhausted by the
| corn crop, is roughly plowed, poorly hsr-
rowed and the oats barely covered. One
| can not Justly look for oats to succeed with
| this treatment. have long ago made up
| my mind, and 80 expressed myself in these
| columns several years ago, that oats were
| 80 exhaustive crop. And so IL Is, IL sew.
| enty or seventy-fve bushels per acre,
! weighing forty 70 forty-fTe pounds, are